Dear Center School Community,

The Center School has just been ranked the number one high school in the Seattle School District for college preparedness! An impressive 89% of our students last year met the established criteria! Our amazing staff, small school environment and arts integrated curriculum are working for our students!

The CSCA has been instrumental in supporting the added curriculum and extras for our staff and students to make this happen. This is accomplished through volunteer hours and donations. We help fund the school’s elective curriculum with fundraising and grant writing.

We are all aware the district is cutting budgets and is unable to fully fund even proven successful programs like our arts integration current curriculum. The financial and volunteer support from the CSCA is more important than ever! The curriculum that has enriched our students to date simply will not be available if the CSCA does not reach its budget goals – nor will the special programs for our staff and students be available without the energy and enthusiasm of parent volunteers.

We all chose to enroll in The Center School for many different reasons, but most revolve around the college prep, arts integrated curriculum in a small school setting. With our choice of this tailored education outside the district norm, comes a responsibility to maintain it. So far this year, we haven’t had the volunteer and financial participation by The Center School parents needed to continue funding future programs. We have been reaching out to you for help throughout the year, but the bottom line now is – the school needs your help and it needs it now!

• The CSCA has not received the anticipated donations to date to continue funding all the existing programs in place.

• CSCA membership is down

• Volunteers from the freshman and sophomore classes are way down from previous years

You need to act today for our students! There are two efforts immediately ahead of us. First are two House Party fundraisers in May. These fundraisers will determine the impact of the CSCA in the 2011-12 school year. We need parents to BOTH volunteer to help put them on and attend them with donations in hand. The second effort is to establish a slate of officers for next year’s board. Virtually all seats are open as the 2010/2011 board consists mostly of junior parents.

So freshman and sophomore parents, what will your student’s education be like in the following years? Will it be the bare minimum that the school district deems acceptable? Now is the time to get involved with the CSCA, be it Board Member, Committee Chair or just taking on an immediate task.  Current board members will still be available next year for some assistance in the transition but the CSCA leadership simply has to be taken over by new parents. Without new parents stepping up, there is nothing we can do. There is also no way around The Center School’s other great need; we all need to donate what we can.

You can make the difference. Contact us now expressing your interest with an email to CSCA@me.com . Or even call me @ 206 935 0934. Please don't fail our students and staff!

Thank you,

Paul Dieter

CSCA President